The American Journal, Dad and Me

The old American Journal building on 4 Dana Street, Westbrook, ME

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esterday I learned that the American Journal was no longer going to be a printed newspaper. Instead, it would transition to an online only product called Westbrook-Gorham Now. The last issue was printed on March 27, 2025.

Originally called the Westbrook American, the changed to the American Journal after it purchased local newspapers that focused on Scarborough and Cape Elizabeth, Maine news. 

My father loved the news. He subscribed to both the daily Portland Press Herald and his favorite, the American Journal--nicknamed the “AJ” --newspaper that came out every Thursday. Dad sometimes referred to the AJ as the “scandal sheet” for some reason.  He’d take one or both of them to work with him.  Dad owned his own paint and wallpaper store. In between customers he’d pull out the American Journal from under the counter and read a bit of it in between customers.  

One summer, dad asked me to work with him. He didn’t have the money to pay for an adult to work for him so I’d be his “paid mule” for a while. It was a win-win. With the money dad paid me I was able to afford my first, serious film camera.

Every day, he’d walk over to the convenience store, twenty feet from his store, and buy an Italian sandwich; hold the onions! He didn’t want to have onion breath when talking to his customers. The lunch wouldn’t be complete without a bag of potato chips and a Moxie soda.

You could tell which one he had read already as it would have oil stains from the Italian sandwich that he ate every day--hold the onions! Dad never used a plate for his sandwich. Instead, he’d use the wax paper wrapper that the sandwich came in.  

More often than not, the oil from the sandwich, of which there was always a generous amount, would leak through the wax paper where the sandwich preparer had cut through it to make two halves.

Dad worked six days a week at his store and on Sunday’s he’d fix or update something on our 100 year old house. There was almost nothing that he enjoyed more than to sit back and relax in his La-Z-Boy chair after dinner to finish reading the AJ while waiting for the local and national news to start. 

Sometimes I’d read the AJ after dad was done with it, oftentimes coming across a pages with grease spots on them. It was steal readable!

The AJ would often publish bits of news that were not important enough to be printed in the much larger Portland Press Herald. My dad knew the AJ publisher, Harry Foote. He’d send Mr. Foote news about my entering the Air Force, graduating from Air Force technical school, my engagement, birth of some of our kids as well as my deployment to Iraq.

Dad...I had an Italian, chips and a soda in memory of you while reading the AJ. I gave the ham to the dogs because I still don’t eat meat. And, I didn’t drink the Moxie because, YUCK! 

I haven’t been a consistent reader of the AJ over the years. I’m sure that many people have good memories of the 58 years it was in print. The newspaper will live on, but you can’t make a news clipping from an online article and tuck it away in a scrapbook or photo album. Still, I’m sad that the printed version is gone.

Hopefully those older than me are hip enough on technology to be able to read the Westbrook  | Gorham NOW ePaper online.